The Adventures Never End

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The Adventures Never End

When the adventure game genre was all but abandoned by the software industry, it seemed the denizens of Monkey Island would be stranded forever. But some fans wouldn't let that happen.

Unwilling to stop pointing or clicking, Roy Lazarovich, a programmer in Israel, developed a continuation of the LucasArts saga. The fan-distributed Night of the Hermit has been played by more than 24,000 adventure game fans who wanted to see life in the tri-island area continue.

"I always liked the feeling and humor that were in all of LucasArts' games," Lazarovich said. "I wasn't trying to make a sequel or prequel to any of the original games. I wanted to give the game something of my own while still making several references to the original games, as well as other games from the company."

A spin-off of the Monkey Island series, the adventure game follows the life of Herman Toothrot, a hermit living on Monkey Island who was in the supporting cast of the original series.

"Herman seemed like a very interesting character to me," Lazarovich said. "I thought it would be fun to get into his shoes. I figured he was getting kind of lonely on the island and would probably appreciate a change of scenery. I do not think my game is anywhere near the original games, and I never tried to shoot for that. It is simply a game made by a fan for the fans."

Night of the Hermit is one of many games available online that were created by fans of the dying genre. From Space Quest to Zak McCracken, fans determined to see the adventure continue have written their own chapters to the sagas.

German programmer Sascha Borisow devoted hundreds of hours to writing The New Adventures of Zak McCracken and released it under the LucasFan brand. A sequel to the 1988 LucasArts title Zak McCracken and the Alien Mindbenders, the game starts where the original left off, following the exploits of the tabloid reporter and game namesake. The graphics are based on the 256-color FM Towns version.

The skills Borisow honed with the unofficial Zak sequel were later used to make a widely downloaded remake of Maniac Mansion, a 1986 LucasArts title.

"It's always good to start small, I think," Borisow said.

But LucasArts isn't the only catalog receiving fan treatments. Several takes on the popular titles of Sierra, the brand name that dominated the genre for two decades, have been made.

One of the most played is Space Quest 0: Replicated, a prequel to the popular series. The game follows star-trekking janitor Roger Wilco through pre-franchise days, à la Phantom Menace. Programmer Jeff Turner actually re-produced the old EGA-style graphics and beeping sounds, and used a text-parser engine reminiscent of the first supplements to the Space Quest series.

Turner has said in interviews that the simple look of the game made it feel like an authentic prequel, but it also helped reduce production time to a few months.

David Fox, the original programmer for Zak McCracken, said he was pleased to see fans so hungry for more gameplay that they would program these fan products and make them widely available for download. He compared the creation of fan sequels to fan fiction for cult TV shows like Star Trek.

"This is really the only way people have to continue playing in these universes that were created," Fox said.

But programming takes more technical knowledge than amateur writing. The games are no small undertaking and usually require a great deal of debugging, even after the games are released. Lazarovich said it took a year and a half to finish Night of the Hermit, a game from which he has never profited a cent.

Upon completion, though, the games have a ready fan base eager to play. And there is less risk of being sued by the corporate owners of the original game titles.

"Companies are usually only concerned when copyrighted material is used in products that are intended to generate money (for) the creator," Lazarovich said. "I don't think they feel threatened by fan games."

Still, Fox doesn't mention the games to the people he still knows at LucasArts, out of fear the company will become sensitive about trademarks and send out cease-and-desist letters.

Even if companies began suing the free-game providers, it seems doubtful the movement could be stopped entirely. Borisow hopes gaming companies will take notice of the continued interest online and start making some official titles.

"The adventure game genre isn't as 'dead' as it used to be," Borisow said. "I must say I'm quite optimistic."